


Nothing is Simple

by aam



Category: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-10 16:11:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18663805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aam/pseuds/aam
Summary: Harvey can't seem to catch a break, especially not where magic is involved.





	Nothing is Simple

He’d been here before, not long enough ago. Sitting, waiting… hoping for good news. It may have been a vain hope, though, as nothing in this mess had been good so far. Mind you, at least the view was nice.

The hospital sat on a hill overlooking Greendale and the river, high enough so that you could even make out the lights of Riverdale across the water. The large window across the back of the waiting room framed an almost peaceful picture: the vista of Greendale in the moonlight made hazy by the mist drifting off the Sweatwater. Flashes of dispersed car lights made it seem as if ghosts travelled the streets.

“Can I get you anything, sweetheart,” a voice startled him from behind. He froze, but only for second before getting a hold of himself. Breaking his gaze, he turned around to find eyes set in a matronly face full of concern. And of pity. He wondered whether he deserved pity. 

“No thank you, ma’am.” He said, trying to ease the stress from his voice,” Do you know when I’ll be able to see him?” 

“In a moment, sweetheart. Just as soon as they settle him down. Once he is stabilized in the unit, the doctor will send for you,” She pursed her lips thoughtfully, although the damned pity never left her eyes. Something on his face must have shown, because she quickly said, “but I’ll see if I can find someone to give you an update."

Trying to look anything but despondent, he thanked her. From the look in her eyes, he had missed his aim. As she walked back to the nursing station, he tried to wrap his head around the situation.  


How did it get to this. Two days ago, his father was simply a man passed out drunk to avoid his memories. Today, he a man passed out with a tube helping him breath. The part in between was a tragedy of errors. He should have thought of it, or rather he had thought of it, he just had assumed it would be alright. When Sabrina had said it would make him stop drinking completely, he had just been happy, even hopeful. He had considered the possibility of withdrawal but thought that magic would have cured that along with the desire. And it was not as if his father had not tried quitting in the past. He had become agitated and gotten the shakes but came out alright. Mind you, he went right back to whiskey when the wind changed. Nevertheless, he should have taken his instincts more seriously, or at least asked Sabrina about possible side effects. After he leaving her house without the pencils, though, he had been too chicken shit to go back and ask.

But he should have God damn known. His father had been alcoholic all his life, drinking to manfully avoid his many issues, not least of which where the deaths of his wife and son. His favorite son. (Not that he could blame him on that count. Tommy had been his favorite too.) It should’ve been obvious that stopping all at once would have been too much. It also should have been obvious that just because he was no longer drinking, he would still search for something to hide from his pain. As a man with admittedly poor coping mechanisms, his father had of course traded in alcohol for street drugs. From what Harvey could piece together, his father managed to make it to the south side of Riverdale despite the onset of delirium tremens, get a hold of some random drug, take it, and then progress from noticeable shaking, agitation, and sweats to full out seizures. Apparently, alcohol withdrawal lowered your seizure threshold, and whatever he took just tipped everything over the edge. He had seen seizures before, volunteering at the hospital and the nursing home. They were not pretty. He knew that during seizures, (at least the major ones: the tonic-clonic and generalized type) all your muscles are contracting. Including your diaphragm. Unfortunately, because your diaphragm is persistently contracted, it did not relax to let air into your lungs. In other words, his father stopped breathing. When the paramedics had found him still shaking, they could not have been sure of how long he had been down. They did what they could and brought him to Greendale General Hospital. Once they identified his father, the sheriff had been dispatched to his house to give him the news and collect him. And so, he had gone out in the middle of the night to see if his father was going to come out of this.

Looking up as the ICU doors opened, he spied a doctor in a white coat stepping into the waiting room with a determined set to his shoulders and a deep, deep pity in his eyes. Eyes looking straight at him. He could guess the answer.


End file.
